Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/606684
NOVEMBER 25 - DECEMBER 1, 2015 UCW 5 WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM The world is sometimes a bad neighborhood. Wars and rumors of wars abound. Fortunately today's column will retain its rose-colored contact lenses to visit the wonderful world of Trivial Pursuits for the Easily Offended. If the world is too much with you, skimming this doggerel is the moral equivalent of reading an entire issue of People Magazine. This column will lower your IQ while keeping you from thinking about anything useful or disturbing. Unable to fix large problems? Focusing on small issues is the ticket to health and happiness. Read about the horrors of Paris elsewhere. True to this column's guiding precept, only dumb stuff shows up here. There is enough goofiness to provide an endless series of topics to distract us from harsh realities. Begin by examining one of the pressing issues of our time, the red Starbucks Christmas cup controversy. If you have time to worry about the color of Starbucks cups then you can throw away your Welbutrin and Prozac. You are officially living a life better than 98 percent of the rest of the world. The Secular Humanists are clearly losing the war against Christmas. The Christmas season advances farther into October each year. This year Christmas paraphernalia appeared in stores before Columbus Day or as it is now known Indigenous Peoples Day. Fearless FaceBookers bravely announced that despite being prohibited from saying "Merry Christmas," they will say it anyway. Huzzah! I have yet to understand who exactly prevents the Yule Tide FaceBookers from saying "Merry Christmas" but it is a matter of great concern. Another set of concerned citizens are the college students at the University of Missouri and Yale who are unhappy about not being allowed safe spaces free of nosy reporters insisting on exercising freedom of the press, being exposed to micro aggressions and possibly offensive Halloween costumes. Having once been a college student, I am a bit puzzled by this sensitivity to reality. College students in my day were proudly insensitive. Recall the immortal lyrics from Bye Bye Birdie, a mostly forgotten '50s musical: "What's the matter with kids today?/Why can't they be like we were?/Perfect in every way/What's the matter with kids today? Reality is quite insensitive. If college students need to have trigger warnings before being exposed to ideas they may find disturbing, how will they deal with a world without trigger warnings like the macro aggressions of Paris? The protests at Mizzou didn't gain much traction until the football team went on strike. The $1 million penalty for the team not showing up got the attention of the president of the university system who promptly resigned. The alums would not be happy with a president who messed up the football team. As Sheriff Andy Taylor once told Barney, "Never, ever mess with Ladies of the Altar Guild." A university football team is the untouchable moral equivalent of the Ladies of the Altar Guild. Speaking of University Presidents, ponder the strange case of newly anointed UNC system President Margaret Spellings. Maggie was recently elected President of UNC at a double secret meeting of the UNC Board of Governors. As soon as Maggie got appointed, the President of the Board of Governors quit abruptly to spend more time with his family and to get out of Dodge. Maggie's main qualification, aside from being a Karl Rove acolyte and running George W. Bush's campaign for Governor of Texas, was that she served on the Board of Directors of Phoenix University. Phoenix U is a for-profit online diploma mill. Perhaps you have seen dear old P.U.'s ads online next to the Viagra ads. P.U . is currently being investigated by the Federal Trade Commission for graduating only about 7 percent of its online students and having a higher than average default rate on the student loans of its students. Being a Renaissance Woman and never one to miss a buck, Maggie also was on the board of a large student loan collection agency. What could possibly go wrong with the UNC system with a juiced in politician like Maggie in charge? The UNC Board of Governor's appointment of Maggie was in response to their mishearing Pink Floyd's song "Another Brick in the Wall," wherein the Floydians almost sing: " We don't need no education/We just need more thought control/Hey teacher leave them kids alone/All in all you're just another brick in Phoenix U's wall/ . Now don't you feel better? My husband and I have owned and operated Das Bavarian Haus Restaurant at 3500 Murchison Road since April of 2014. I read the piece in your Best Of Fayetteville edition about Murchison Road being "the thing we should hide from out-of-town visitors." It is true that Murchison Road has had a reputation for being a place to avoid. I understand that your article was the result of a survey and not necessarily your viewpoint. However, I was dismayed by the wording of the last sentence that said, "Keep out of town visitors far away." By doing that you lumped the entire "Murch," as many call it, into one category. Out-of-towners who are looking for German cuisine find us on the Internet, see our favorable reviews, and decide to make our restaurant a destination. They don't have any history of prejudice against the Murchison Road area. Along with our many local regular guests, they have no problem coming to our little corner of the world. They leave full and happy, with good feelings toward Fayetteville. They feel welcome and they spend money at other establishments while they are in town. They come from as far away as Raleigh, Sanford and Pinehurst just to dine at our modest little oasis. So when we see our area slammed in the paper, it just reinforces the belief of many Fayetteville residents that all of "The Murch" is a down trodden, dangerous section of town. Murchison Road is an up and coming place, with new construction, stable businesses and great possibilities. The old Winn Dixie strip mall that was across the street from us will soon be replaced by a Walmart Neighborhood Market and several small shops. So please print this to let your readers know - "Don't Shirk the Murch!" Also, our congratulations to all of the winners of the Best Of Fayetteville in Up & Coming Weekly. We would like to apply for next year's Best of Fayetteville in the "Best German Restaurant" and the "Best Reuben Sandwich" categories! Thanks so much for your input. – Vicki Hogan After reading your editorial piece in the Up and Coming Weekly, I was just going to move on and let it go, but I changed my mind. Though I agree with you on some issues I have to call you out on some other issues. First the Fayetteville mayor's race. I did not have any skin in that game because I do not live in the city of Fayetteville, but I have family and friends that do. I asked them mainly the young folks ages 19-30 all races did they go vote to decide who was going to be the Mayor of Fayetteville. Their answer, "What race?" I was not surprised at all. I told them because they did not go vote, they cannot complain about things not getting done in their neighborhood or city because they have no voice. Mr. (Andrew) Barksdale (Fayetteville Observer) did hit on some points, but he could have done it in a much better way. Bottom line, Mr. Robinson is the mayor and it's time to move on and get some things done for this great city. Now come on Mr. Bowman, you stated that you only hear divisive talk and behavior from liberal talk shows and the daily newspaper? So I take it you never heard anything divisive coming from Rush Limbaugh, Donald Trump (even bashes his fellow candidates)... I could name more but I will just leave it at that. We as a city, county, state and country better get our house in order. We are so busy arguing and fighting among ourselves over politics, race, good cop/bad cop, the only time we come together as a country is when something bad happens to our fellow American citizens in an act of terror. We have some very bad people out there who want to do us harm like the horrific events that took place in Paris. Mr. Bowman, those terrorist don't care if we are white, black, Hispanic, Asian, Jew, Republican, Democrat, Independent, straight, gay, lesbian, Christian or atheist. We are Americans and they want to hurt us. I am not going to hold my breath hoping that we can all get along but I hope and pray that we can. – L. Smith. Don't Shirk the Murch and It's Time We Know Our Real Enemy LETTERS TO THE EDITOR PITT DICKEY. Columnist. COMMENTS? Editor@upandcomin- gweekly.com. 910.484.6200. Trivial Pursuits for the Easily Offended by PITT DICKEY